Iran-Israel Update
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(2 weeks, 2 days ago)
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Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The threat of imminent famine hangs over the people of Gaza; aid urgently needs to get into the country and to be safely distributed. With the deaths of those three UK charity workers, working for World Central Kitchen, will the Prime Minister confirm whether he has received a written apology from the Prime Minister of Israel?
The Prime Minister
I spoke explicitly to the Prime Minister of Israel, who did that when I spoke to him the very next day. We have made absolutely crystal clear our concerns about what has happened, and as I have previously pointed out, we are now looking through the preliminary findings. We are pleased to see the early suspension of two officers involved; now what we need is reform of Israel’s deconfliction mechanism to ensure the future safety of aid workers.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(2 months, 1 week ago)
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The Prime Minister
May I welcome my hon. Friend back to his place? I agree with everything he said, and I look forward to visiting him and his Romford constituents at the earliest opportunity.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
I have not seen the details of those comments and this issue. More generally, the Government have a strong track record of supporting those with disabilities. It is important that children with special educational needs receive the right support in the right place at the right time. We have seen funding for SEN increase by 60% over this Parliament to more than £10 billion. Most recently, the Department for Education and the Department of Health and Social Care are piloting a new project to improve access to specialty support in mainstream primary schools, because we want to make sure that these children get all the support and opportunities they deserve.
Defending the UK and Allies
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(3 months, 2 weeks ago)
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The Prime Minister
As I have said previously, we do support a ceasefire but it must be sustainable, and multiple things have to happen for it to be so. As I have also said previously, we remain committed to a two-state solution, because I believe in a future—as do the Government and, I think, the House—in which Palestinian and Israeli people can live side by side in peace and security and in which everyone can live their lives with dignity and opportunity. That is the future that we are striving to build.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
I welcome the Prime Minister’s remarks about the situation in Ukraine and our commitment in that regard. However, the escalation and conflagration of the situation in the middle east, which has seen 23,000 deaths of civilians including children, is not only shocking but is now extending to a crisis of other nations and across the world. Does the Prime Minister agree that we need to see a negotiated ceasefire in Gaza, and that ultimately, 30 years on from the Oslo accords, we have to see a “land for peace” negotiated deal?
The Prime Minister
No one wants to see this conflict go on a moment longer than is necessary. We support a ceasefire, but it must be a sustainable ceasefire that will last. That means Hamas releasing hostages, but also no longer being able to threaten Israel with rocket attacks and other forms of terrorism. In the meantime, we will do everything we can to get more aid into Gaza.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(1 year, 2 months ago)
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The Prime Minister
My right hon. and learned Friend is absolutely right that we need to keep going, but he is also right that we need to find enduring solutions to the challenges faced by the people of Northern Ireland. That is why, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Lagan Valley (Sir Jeffrey M. Donaldson) mentioned earlier, it is absolutely right that we address the constitutional and legal framework of our arrangements and ensure that we can put in place new arrangements that secure Northern Ireland’s place in the UK.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The Prime Minister
The hon. Gentleman may not have seen that the Royal College of Nursing is now in talks with the Government about resolving the disputes, and I am grateful to it for entering those talks with a constructive attitude, and for calling off its strikes next week. I urge him and his colleagues to be on the side of working people—that is, to back our laws to introduce minimum safety levels across the NHS and transport, because that is the best way to demonstrate you are on the side of hard-working families.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(1 year, 11 months ago)
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Rishi Sunak
There is an enormous amount to correct in the hon. Lady’s question. In aggregate, across the economy, savings increased over the past two years by more than £250 billion. Of course, that will not be distributed equally, but there is resilience. Consumer credit, on which those on lower incomes particularly rely, has also fallen by about £30 billion over the past two years. Households approach this period of difficulty in a more resilient shape than at any point in the past decade.
The comments by the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Rachel Maclean), are absolutely right. It is wrong to take them out of context. This party and this Government are proud to be on the side of hard-working people. We want to support them into work, and we want to make sure that work pays. She was absolutely right to say what she said.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The Economy
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(4 years ago)
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Rishi Sunak
As I hope I have demonstrated over the past six to eight weeks, I am always open to new ideas, whether at home or abroad. I have constantly sought to refine, to improve, to iterate and to respond to circumstances on the ground to make sure that our economic response is as comprehensive and effective as it can be. I can give my hon. Friend an assurance that I will continue to do just that.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
Businesses in Warwick and Leamington, much like those across the country, have been burning through cash in recent weeks and have been desperate for a cash injection. I welcome the Chancellor’s announcement today, but does he accept the view of Neel Kashkari, who ran the US federal bail-out programme in 2008-09, that what is critical is getting the money out as quickly and as simply as possible—like the French, who have lent seven times more than the UK, or the Germans, who have lent three times more? Does he accept that we have been too slow and too deliberative?
Rishi Sunak
Different countries have done things in very different ways. The hon. Gentleman talked about the US; the US has no equivalent of our furlough scheme, which is probably the most significant economic intervention that we have put in place—it was up and running four weeks after I announced it and is already, as we speak, getting money to businesses to pay wages. He talked about other European countries; there is a range. We have now issued more CBILS loans than the equivalent scheme in Germany.
Economic Update
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(4 years, 1 month ago)
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Rishi Sunak
My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is doing an excellent job, making sure that our borders are secure and that we enforce our laws as required, but in a way that is humane and compatible with all human rights. I am sure that she will do exactly that as we go through the challenging next few months.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The Chancellor will be aware that in certain business sectors, the loss of just one or two people in specialised roles from an organisation can bring down a business. France and Italy are reviving the approach adopted in a global financial crash of supporting workers with a proportion of their wages. Will the Chancellor do the same here?
Rishi Sunak
As I have said, we are considering employment support packages and what can be designed and implemented at pace. As for other countries, let me again put it on record that the fiscal interventions we have undertaken are comparable in size with those of any other major developed economy.
Local Government in Gloucestershire
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Rishi Sunak)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. I congratulate the hon. Member for Stroud (Dr Drew) on securing this important debate. I very much recognise and respect his long-standing personal views on the topic, no doubt informed by his many years of service at various tiers of local Government, which I am sure he draws on today. He will have heard me say before that, when requested, the Government are committed to consider locally led proposals for unitarisations and mergers between councils. He will also know that we recently legislated to create two new unitary councils in Dorset, as well as mergers of district councils in Somerset West and Taunton, East Suffolk and West Suffolk. In each of those cases, the councils developed their proposals locally, as is currently happening in Northamptonshire, where a public consultation is underway to help inform the councils’ proposals for the Secretary of State.
Turning to Gloucestershire, there is currently the county council and the six district and borough councils, and adjacent to the administrative county there is also the unitary council of South Gloucestershire. It is important to state for the record that the Department has received no proposals from the county council or any of the district councils for local government reorganisation in Gloucestershire. I am not aware of any other plans in development that are to be presented to me imminently. The Government’s stated policy is to consider any locally led proposals that are submitted.
To answer the hon. Gentleman’s first question, it might be helpful for me to talk a little about the processes for unitarisation. There are two legislative processes that can be used. First, the Cities and Local Government Devolution Act 2016 allows a process to proceed if at least one affected authority consents. This process was used recently for the creation of the two unitary councils in Dorset. Secondly, we can use the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007, as we are currently doing for Northamptonshire. Regardless of the legislative process used, the Government have been clear on what our criteria for unitisation are and how the Secretary of State will assess any proposal.
I want to spend a moment outlining the three main criteria. First, the proposal has to be likely to improve local government in the area, by improving service delivery, giving greater value for money, yielding cost savings, providing stronger strategic and local leadership, delivering more sustainable structures and avoiding fragmentation of major services. Secondly, the proposed structure has to be for a credible geography, consisting of one or more existing local government areas, and the population of any unitary authority must be substantial.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
So many authorities are under significant financial pressure, as the Minister described. The majority of those named are smaller, more rural authorities. In that light, is it not appropriate to go through this exercise as a matter of course, to explore what sort of cost savings could be made? In Warwickshire that would enable us to understand what sort of savings and efficiency improvements in the services delivered could be made.
Rishi Sunak
We are here to talk about Gloucestershire today and not Warwickshire, but I will address the hon. Gentleman’s underlying question about the Government’s role in this process when I answer the second question from the hon. Member for Stroud.
The third criterion for judging a proposal is that it commands local support. In particular, the structure must be proposed by one or more existing councils in the area and there is evidence of a good deal of local support, including from business, the voluntary sector, public bodies and local communities.
Matt Western
To that end, rather than just getting anecdotal support from businesses and other organisations, would the Minister support going to the public with that at the time of an election or through a referendum?
Rishi Sunak
The hon. Gentleman anticipates what I was about to say, so let me elaborate on what the Government mean by a good deal of local support. The Government would like that to be assessed across the area from business, the voluntary sectors, public bodies and local communities. That does not mean unanimous agreement from all councils, stakeholders and residents, but it is vital that any proposals to change structures in local government are truly locally led. That is why we feel that a public consultation is so important.
That has been the experience of recent proposals, where the councils involved have used opinion services or consultants to engage extensively with the public through discourse, surveys and events, to ensure that they have captured the state of public opinion on the proposals they are due to submit to the Department. Having received those proposals, following an invitation, the Secretary of State must consult all affected local authorities that are not signed up to the proposal, and any other persons he considers appropriate, before reaching a decision, judged against the three criteria I outlined. The extent of any consultation would depend on the extent of the consultation that those making the proposal have already carried out.
It is essential that those making a proposal carry out an effective consultation before submitting their proposal, not least to provide evidence about the level of local support. The Secretary of State may then implement the proposal by order, with or without modification, or decide to take no action. Such an order is subject to the affirmative resolution procedure but does not require the consent of any council.
Let me turn to the question from the hon. Member for Stroud about the Government’s role. He will hopefully have seen as I have been outlining the process that our role is to receive proposals developed locally in a particular area; it is not to enforce or dictate from on high the organisation of any local area’s affairs. It is for local councils and local people to develop those proposals. However, as he said in alluding to the new Secretary of State’s remarks, the Government remain open and willing to engage with areas that want to embark on this journey and will willingly receive proposals and adjudicate on them in due course.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Rishi Sunak and Matt Western(6 years, 1 month ago)
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Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Rishi Sunak)
The 2018-19 settlement is the third year of a four-year deal providing funding certainty and is accepted by 97% of councils. The settlement sees a real-terms increase in resources to local government over the next two years, totalling £45.1 billion in the forthcoming financial year.
Matt Western
In a letter to the Secretary of State last month, the Conservative leader of Warwickshire County Council stated that in the council’s view the current funding model for local government is unsustainable. Is she correct?
Rishi Sunak
I appreciate that the hon. Gentleman makes a point about the funding settlement and the formula. He will know from his membership of the Select Committee, which I have just had the pleasure to appear before, that we are looking very hard at the structure of local government financing, both increasing the amount of business rates retentions to 75% and introducing a new needs-based formula that takes into account updated needs and resources. I know his Committee will play a huge part in making sure that we get that right for Warwickshire and for the country.